


Fight or Flight Response

by crocs (orphan_account)



Series: The Thing With Feathers [2]
Category: Avengers: Endgame (2019), Avengers: Infinity War (2018), Black Panther (2018), Spider-Man Homecoming (2017)
Genre: Endgame compliant, F/F, Kissing, Natasha's Team (Endgame), Training
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-31
Updated: 2019-08-31
Packaged: 2020-10-04 05:08:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,487
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20465510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/crocs
Summary: Captain Marvel? RocketRaccoon? Now Nat was just making up people. Liz briefly wondered how the power to turn into a raccoon would work — and why anyone would want to.(Oneshot, two weeks post-Migratory Patterns. Liz Toomes gets recruited.)





	Fight or Flight Response

**Author's Note:**

> A little interlude.
> 
> Disclaimer: I don't own anything.

__"I'm pretty sure," Shuri said, twirling her staff above her head, "kissing me to distract me from whooping your ass is an illegal move."

She had her knees planted either side of Liz's torso, pinning her to the training mat. Liz herself was splayed on the floor, out of breath and grinning from ear to ear.

Liz tilted her head. "It worked, didn’t it?"

"Yes," she allowed, visibly biting down a smile, "but _then_ I caught wind of it."

"Ah, and then _I_ got pressed to a mat by a very attractive person," Liz carried on. "All according to plan."

"Well, how about we run your plan again?" Shuri propped her staff against the nearby wall. She leant further down. "Check for any… possible problems with it."

Liz breathed in. "Good idea," she said, and leant up to kiss her.

The heat rose in her cheeks as their lips touched.

They'd done this a few times already, and then a few times more — but every time felt like the first time, discovering something — some_one_ — new. It was straining the back of her neck, craning up to kiss her like that, so Liz manuevered her legs so they could hook around Liz's torso. With a tug, she flipped them over so they were both laying on their side.

Luckily, the mats were soft.

And, even more luckily, Shuri was softer.

Liz cradled her head with her arm laying flat on the floor. Shuri wiggled closer to her, and she had to turn her head for a moment so that she wasn't laughing directly in her face. Shuri nuzzled their noses together.

"Hey, there." Her breath tickled.

Liz smiled. "Right back at you."

Shuri rolled over to face the ceiling and groaned. "Ugh, you're too pretty to practise with! Ayo's going to ship me back if she finds out we've been getting distracted again."

"I'm going to take that —" she poked Shuri on the nose — "as a compliment." Liz's brows furrowed. "…When _do_ you go back, anyway?"

Shuri looked down. "…Tomorrow."

She couldn't have heard her right. "Sorry, did you say —"

"I only found out this morning," Shuri cut in, one hand up in surrender. She was still resolutely not looking at Liz. "But we've talked, the Tribal Council and I. Wakanda needs me. Black Panther or not."

"I…" Liz sat up too fast. She blinked the dizziness away. "This is fast."

"Not really." Shuri rose, tucking her knees under her chin. "You have to remember, I left Wakanda after my brother died. I had to. But if I stay any longer…"

"…They'll think you ran," Liz said. "You're not a runner, though."

"No, I am not," said Shuri. "But I will be if I don't go back."

A lump suddenly formed in Liz's throat. Back when she'd left everything behind for Oregon, it had been hard — but she'd never, ever been on the other side of it. She wondered if anyone felt that way about her, way back when. And it wasn't like she'd had three years with Shuri — they'd been fire-forged friends. And then they'd been more than that.

For all of two weeks.

It wasn't _fair_.

"We can keep in touch," she said, and hated how pathetic it sounded coming out of her mouth. Keeping in touch. Liz knew first hand how tough that was. If she and Flash hadn't struck up that friendship, it was more than likely all her friends would be in Oregon right now. The few that were left.

Maybe that was why it was important to overcome that toughness.

Shuri looked up. Her eyes were serious. "Liz —"

Before she could finish her sentence, though, the door to the training room slid open.

Flash stepped through the door, his hair up in a hastily scraped together ponytail. His eyes were wide and Liz could see that his hands, even though they were stuffed in his pockets, were shaking.

He made a gesture between Liz and Shuri. "Is, uh — is this a part of your training?"

Liz sat up. "Flash, what's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong. I'm, uh — kinda starstruck, that's all." Flash shook his head. "Liz, you've got a visitor out in the garden room."

Liz stood, slowly.

She shot Flash a concerned look as he hovered near the doorway, and then nearly flattened himself against the smart wall when she went to walk though. The last time he'd been like this had been — well, it had been Homecoming, when he swore Spider-Man had taken his car.

She slipped out into the corridor. The walls to the garden room was lined with plants. The signs that had directions in just one language were few and far between — most of them were in Xhosa with Afrikaans and English written underneath, and all of them had Braille running along the bottom.

Liz didn't need them. The last two weeks had mostly been spent at the Embassy, while the dust settled — both metaphorically and not. Ayo had come though in her promise of 'rectifying' Liz's fighting.

Mostly, though, Ayo had left the actual training part to the instructors that had been brought over to teach self-defence at the new Outreach Center; Liz had been knocked on her butt by former War Dogs and retired Dora Milaje members more times than she could count.

But it was exhilarating. And terrifying.

She turned a corner into the garden room.

The place was covered in native Wakandan plants that grew up the walls. They shied just short of the glass roof that hung above Liz's head. In hanging baskets, tiny flowers peeked over the edge. Their shadows swayed in the artificial breeze, draped over the tiled floor.

A wooden, carved bench was placed deliberately in the middle. It was fairly high, so the feet of the woman that was sat on it barely touched the tiles. The woman's head turned slightly, hearing Liz come in.

"Cop a seat," Nat said, patting the space next to her. "I've got something of yours."

Quiet — though she wasn't sure whether or not it was because of shock — Liz complied. "What's that, then?"

Nat reached down to her swinging legs. Next to her left one sat a metal briefcase — one that looked suspiciously like the one she found the wings in in the first place.

"Found it on a Dumpster," she said, passing it to Liz.

Liz took it with both hands. It was much lighter than when it had had the wings in it, she noted.

"Thanks," she said, at length. "How did you know it was —"

"Yours? I'm a super-spy," said Nat, with a small smile. "There were cameras all around that alley. I wiped them for you, don't worry."

"…Right." Liz folded her hands over the briefcase, putting it on her lap. It felt like she was on some kind of tightrope — one where the line was so razor thin she was bound to stumble and get arrested.

She wondered how long Nat had known about her being a vigilante. Since the Met? Sometime in the past two weeks?

Liz shook her head. Nat was an Avenger — and according to the SHIELD leaks, an agent before that. The Avengers didn't have the power to make arrests, especially not for actually breaking the law — seeing as though it was basically founded by a guy that made his living after lying on his Army forms. Plus, SHIELD had fallen.

But if Nat wasn't here to _stop_ her…

Liz took a steadying breath. "What are you doing here, Nat?"

Nat's little smile turned taut.

"I'm following my own advice," she said at last, lacing her fingers together on her lap. "I'm not being afraid to ask for help."

_Oh. _Liz tilted her head, waiting for Nat to carry on.

"I'm putting together a team. Operatives, all over the world," she elaborated. "Keeping it safe, in memory of those that died trying to do so — and to make sure that it never happens again."

Liz's brow furrowed. "What, like the Avengers?"

"Sort of," Nat hedged. "The Avengers Initiative was a ticking time bomb, full of people that barely clicked unless we were fighting. Most of the time, we were fighting each other. What this new team would do would just be reporting in — and keeping their respective areas safe."

"And you…" Liz trailed off. "You want _me_ to join. Me."

"Yes."

_What._

"I've been doing this for a hot minute. I'm not the saving-the-world type." Liz frowned. "I can manage maybe a couple of blocks at best, if it was just me in one area. And that's not even counting the property damage I did when I fought Connors."

"I wouldn’t be asking you to do that," Nat replied, her voice soft. "Now that Spider-Man's missing, Midtown needs a hero. New York needs a hero."

A hero, thought Liz. Right.

"I don't even live here," she said, but knew it was a losing battle. She'd been looking into transferring colleges to New York — everyone was, really, trying to get close to what was left of their families. And the last of Liz's own were here, in this city.

Nat just looked at her knowingly.

"I hear Empire State University has a good aerophysics program," she said, almost conversationally. "I could put in a good word for you with the dean."

"You know the dean?"

"I'll be able to make him think that I know him," Nat hedged.

Liz knew from context that she wasn't probably supposed to feel assured at this, but she somehow did. "Thanks," she said. "So this team, then. Who would be on it? Me, you… the other Avengers? Captain America's still a war criminal, Iron Man's dead, Hulk's… not Hulk anymore and the rest — I don't know. Half of them are gone, Nat."

"I know," Nat said. She crossed her leg over her other one gracefully. The swinging stopped. "It'd be me, you, Steve, James Rhodes, Captain Marvel, General Okoye, Rocket Raccoon, Nebula — and more, if I can get them."

Captain Marvel? Rocket _Raccoon_? Now Nat was just making up people. Liz briefly wondered how the power to turn into a raccoon would work — and why anyone would want to.

"What aren't you telling me?"

Nat raised an eyebrow. "I read your file," she started, digging around in her bag — a bag that Liz hadn't noticed was there until she started rifling through it.

She produced a brown folder, slightly thicker than Liz would have expected it to be. She accepted it and let it flop over, ID photos of her from high school and college pasted at the front. A black watermark was stamped on top — a bird inside of a circle. Words formed in an arm above its outstretched wings; this was a SHIELD file.

"I thought SHIELD fell," Liz commented, flicking through. A copy of her dental records. A drawing that she'd done for her dad after the Battle of New York. Blueprints of the warehouse — an exact copy of the one she'd gotten from Uncle Mason at the Met.

Nat shrugged, her shoulders bouncing just out of the corner of Liz's eye. "If HYDRA can grow two heads after one's cut off, we can get back up too."

Liz finally got to the place that she was certain Nat was talking about. Her fingers gave a small tremble as they traced the words on the police report that had come after her Dad's arrest — the one detailing his connection to Spider-Man and Tony Stark.

"He's alive, isn't he?" Liz asked. "Spider-Man."

Nat shook her head, and her heart sunk. "Close," she said. "Tony's home. He's alive."

"Tony," Liz repeated. The word felt strange on her mouth. "He'd be helping, then?"

She shook her head. "Retired." Nat leant back. "I can't say he doesn't deserve some rest, after it all."

Liz nodded, and then paused. "Are you sure… it'd work? Without Stark?"

"I want to make sure it would," said Nat. "I know how you feel about him."

"How?"

Silently, Nat opened the SHIELD dossier to a page detailing her father's arrest.

On the opposite side was a deep history — and a lump in her throat began to form as her eyes danced across the words. How he'd been fired from cleaning up the Battle of New York after Stark had brought in Damage Control. _Everything_ about the arms dealing.

And every minute detail about her father attempting to steal Stark's cargo plane full of the Avengers' old stuff.

It was all written in the blandest tone possible.

Every phrase was impartial, cold — Liz immediately felt like something was missing, even though she couldn't pinpoint what. Liz suddenly realised that it was a perspective, an opinion; not hers or the one she knew Stark had, but an outsider's. One that was able to see all sides of the story. And every bias.

Like the one that she had.

Liz closed the folder. "Yeah," she said, quietly. "I guess you do. I think I need some time to think about it."

"It's a lot to think about," Nat agreed. "I don't think we even knew what we were getting into back then, let alone now."

"I have your number. Uh, your business card."

Nat huffed. "I guess you do," she allowed, taking the hint and standing. Nat grasped the bag she'd came with, deftly lifting it into the air as she turned to go.

Liz ran her fingers over the raised SHIELD eagle on the file. "Nat?"

Nat's footsteps paused.

"At the Met, when we… met. Did you know what I was about to do?"

Silence, and then —

"I just saw someone who looked like they needed some advice."

Liz nodded. "Right."

When she looked behind her again, Nat was gone. The door was still swinging, but the hallway was empty; Liz assumed that the one after would be empty, too.

Alone, she turned the folder over in her hands so the back was face-up. Just as she did, a slip of paper fell to the tiled floor. It was just out of reach. Liz stood and bent to pick it up.

Sketch paper. A charcoal portrait. Her eyes widened as she recognised the art.

It was _Portrait of a Soldier._ But not. Something was different. The man the Sergeant had his arm around was finally out of the shadows. His hair hung in front of his face and his clothes were too large for him, but it was definitely the same silhouette. His eyes were bright. His face was set. Just like the soldier.

That wasn't the only difference.

A detailed falcon was soaring over their heads. The two were looking up at it as it took flight; the bird had left a trail, just like an airplane would. Its wings had a metallic sheen to them.

Liz flipped it over.

Sharply defined letters were printed at the bottom of the paper.

_Self-portrait. Steve Rogers, 2018._

Huh.

**Author's Note:**

> Next time: the Endgame Fic, in capital letters.
> 
> Thank you so much for reading!


End file.
